


you'll come back when it's over

by rainekind



Category: Dangan Ronpa
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Bittersweet Ending, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-04
Updated: 2013-08-04
Packaged: 2017-12-22 09:35:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/911677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainekind/pseuds/rainekind
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>no need to say goodbye</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I.

“I want to come with you,” Peko said, voice desperate. She clasped Mukuro’s hand with both of her own, wide scarlet eyes flitting to each and every part of her face. “Don’t…don’t go out there alone.” Mukuro shook her head, face composed as usual, but this time, her eyes were half-lidded, brow furrowed. Peko opened her mouth to speak again, but the soldier gave her a look that made her breath catch in her throat.   
“Don’t…don’t-don’t leave me here,” the swordswoman choked out. She hadn’t meant for it to sound so small, so fucking desperate, but it tumbled out before she could control it. Mukuro couldn’t look into her eyes, she couldn’t deal with her like this and she just wanted to kiss her and tell her it would be alright. She wanted to refuse, to send the two men outside away from there and live in peace for once in her life, but she remembered what they had said–they’d only leave Peko alone if Mukuro agreed to be their weapon in this war. She had to do it, for the swordswoman’s sake. She took a deep breath and put everything she had into giving Peko a small, reassuring smile.  
“I’ll be fine” was the last thing she said to her before the two higher-ups marched her out the door. Peko stared after her, taking a step outside before stopping herself. Mukuro had gone into battle many times before, right? Just because she was going into it as the government’s weapon instead of a foot soldier shouldn’t…be any different. All Mukuro had told her was that the government had specially requested her, and that this would be easy. It would just be like every other battle she’d been in. Peko sighed, sinking down into a chair in the kitchen. ‘I’ll only be gone for two…maybe three weeks,’ she’d said. ‘Keep yourself busy until then, just. Try not to think about it.’ She forced herself to smile, shaking her head and standing up. She could always bake, read…maybe invite Fuyuhiko over. And then she remembered Fuyuhiko had stopped talking to her after they’d gotten into an argument. She’d have to resolve that somehow. Well, at least there would be a lot to do, right? Mukuro would be back before she knew it.   
The first three days passed, and Peko spent them learning how to make croissants from scratch. The first day, she almost burned the house down; the second day, they tasted fairly awful, but they didn’t burn; the third day they were too flat but at least they tasted okay. She continued to make them throughout the week, sending them to her friends in little gift bags. She received fruit tarts in return from Hanamura, and wished she could share them with Mukuro.  
The first day of the second week was slow; she went jogging in the morning, then practiced with Sakura in the dojo for hours. When she refused to quit and worked too hard for her own body, Sakura noticed and stopped her, and they sat down and had a feelings talk.   
“I think she is right. You should not worry yourself to such an extent. She will most likely be back by the end of this week, if not the end of the next,” the wrestler told her. “Asahina and I are hosting a dinner gathering on the twenty-second. She will be back by then, would you two like to come?”  
Peko agreed, bowing in thanks to Sakura before leaving the dojo and getting onto her bicycle. Souda had built the bike for her birthday last year, plus Chihiro had given her a tiny GPS for the front of it, and it hadn’t failed her once. She rode back to her and Mukuro’s apartment, checking the mailbox eagerly as soon as she parked and locked her bike. Flyers, catalogs, nothing of importance. She shook her head and closed the box. Mukuro hadn’t written her–well, of course she hadn’t. She had given her an address to write to, however. Peko hadn’t wanted to be a burden, so she’d only written to her last Friday. However, it had been a week and she hadn’t received a response yet. Maybe…maybe she was just busy. There was no reason to give up yet.  
Peko walked into the apartment and dropped the junk mail into the trashcan by the door. She walked across the room and took her braids down, staring into the full-body mirror as her silver hair fell to the middle of her back. Mukuro liked her hair, even though she remembered getting teased about it. The swordswoman couldn’t help but smile a little as she remembered Mukuro running her hands through her hair, remembered them sitting on the windowsill with interlocked bodies, wearing nothing as the sun had warmed their bodies. She remembered walking to the lake to swim with her in the middle of the night, and attending parties they hadn’t wanted to go to.   
Peko was jerked out of the pleasant stream of memories as the phone rang. She jumped and turned around too quickly, tripping over her feet and falling face-first onto a pile of laundry she’d forgotten to fold. Dammit. Mukuro would have laughed at the mess-up and not let it go for a week. Okay, Peko, stop thinking about her for now, she will be back this weekend, in time for Sakura’s dinner. She stood up and picked up the phone, murmuring a strained “Hello?” because she spoke before her mind caught up with her and it sounded rather mangled.   
“Peko? You okay?”   
“M-Mahiru! Yes, I am fine.”  
“Good, I was getting worried, y’know! Anyway. The girls are coming over to my house to have a sleepover, you in?”  
Peko paused. She would have refused if not for remembering Mukuro’s words: Keep yourself busy until then. She needed distractions, so she said yes even though she didn’t want to go at all.  
“Great! Bring pajamas and a movie or something, it’s starting at six, so ya better be there, ‘kay?”  
“…Alright. I’ll see you there.” Peko hung up the phone, placing it on the desk and looking at the time. It was five-thirty, so she should head out. She sighed. Why did she have to have such outgoing friends?   
After some incoherent grumbling and choosing Mukuro’s pajamas to sleep in because they smelled like her, Peko got on her bike and headed over to Mahiru’s house. It was a generally long ride, but at least it wasn’t getting dark out or anything. She passed Fuyuhiko’s house on the way. The windows were un-curtained and she could see him inside, his fuzzy hair being attacked by his two-year-old niece. She smiled and passed it before riding for five more minutes and eventually stopping at Mahiru’s spacious house. Once there, she stopped, a quizzical look on her face. Was that…Hanamura? He was standing atop who looked like Souda’s shoulders, trying to peek into the window...they still do that, huh? Well, she might as well stop them, since it was and always had been irritating. Peko went onto stealth mode and walked behind them. She paused before grabbing them by the collars harshly and pulling them apart, giving the two now-screaming boys a warning glare. Souda burst into tears and Hanamura tried to get a peek up her skirt, before she marched up to the door and pushed the doorbell with her foot.  
Mahiru opened the door to find an unamused Peko, holding Hanamura and Souda by their collars. “They were trying to look inside,” Peko said. Mahiru gave her the look that meant the boys were going to experience the ultimate punishment. Peko knew exactly what she was thinking and brought them inside; the next thing the two knew, they were wrapped up in tape, blindfolded, and forced to listen to Caramelldansen on repeat for the duration of the sleepover.  
They had been watching Howl’s Moving Castle when it happened. Peko felt a vibration in her pocket, and took out her cell phone. The number was unrecognized, but she stood and walked into the bathroom to answer it anyway. “Hello?”  
“Honey, Mitchie’s back from the war! Apparently it ended and he came back yesterday, I’ve been crying out of happiness for two hours! What do we do!?”  
“…I’m sorry, ma’am, you have the wrong number.”  
“OH! I’m so, so sorry! I’ll ju—“  
“Did you say the war was over?”  
“Yes, I did! My son got back home yesterday.”  
“…Okay. Thank you, ma’am. Congratulations on your son’s return.”  
“Thanks a lot!”  
The strange woman hung up the phone, and Peko’s heart was beating in her throat. She stared at the phone in her hands. If that was the case, shouldn’t Mukuro have come home yesterday with all the others? She swallowed nervously, walking out of the bathroom and muttering a rushed “I have to go” before running out of the house and biking home as quickly as she could. As soon as she got inside, she checked the phone for messages and checked the mailbox. Nothing, of course. Well…she shouldn’t freak out yet—maybe Mukuro got held up? Maybe the government wanted her to do an extra job and it would take her a few days. Peko took a deep breath, resolving to stay in her apartment and not leave until Mukuro was back. It should only be a few days.  
And so Peko spent the next three days inside her apartment before realizing that was a really stupid idea and going out the next day to grocery shop. The entire next week eventually passed, and then another, and Peko heard zero about Mukuro. There was absolutely nothing and she had been getting more and more depressed as time went on. Eventually she stopped answering phone calls, stopped checking her mailbox, and as a month passed, stopped going out of the house. 

It was a day after a month when she got the phone call. Someone kept calling and even when she didn’t answer, they kept calling and calling until she eventually picked up. “What?”  
“Peko.” It was Celestia, someone she did not expect to hear.  
“…”  
“It’s about Mukuro.”


	2. II.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry the ending is short, i decided to break it into a long and a short chapter so that it wasn't giant ;w;

“I was told to inform you that ‘Mukuro Ikusaba was not, in fact, drafted to war, but killed immediately after being taken into official custody.’”  
Peko didn’t know what happened then, but something inside her snapped. She gripped the phone so tightly her knuckles were white and her hands began shaking, along with the rest of her body. Her hand lost the grip and the phone clattered to the ground. She heard Celes hang up from the other end, and she smelled her toast burning, but neither of those registered as she collapsed. Peko didn’t faint, no, but she lost control of her muscles and lay on her side, staring blankly at the wall for a length of time she couldn’t count.

She didn’t know what exactly did it. All she knew was that she saw Mukuro in front of her then, and she wondered how she got there.  
“I can’t believe you, Peko,” she said. Except it wasn’t her voice, it was someone else’s—and it pierced her mind through.  
Because Fuyuhiko Kuzuryuu was standing above her, hands on his hips. He’d gathered enough by the way Peko was lying – and the phone on the ground next to her. He had felt bad about not telling her himself and knew she wouldn’t take it well, so he’d driven to her apartment to check on her. She hadn’t even registered the knocking, obviously, so he’d walked into the unlocked door and found her like that—pathetic, curled up on the floor with tears streaming down her face. It hurt him and it made him angry to see her like this, but she had been helping him for his entire life so it was time for him to return the favor.  
“Okay. …Okay. Peko, listen to me. D’you think…fuck, do you really fucking think she’d want to see you like this? It’s pathetic, goddammit, where’s your courage!? What the fuck’s gotten into you!? Peko. Stand—stand up, okay?” He crouched and pulled her arm around his shoulder, heaving them both up and dragging her to the office chair. She complied, but didn’t say anything, so he bent down in front of her and looked very sincerely into her face. He…well, he had no idea what to do in this situation? But he knew that he couldn’t just leave her there, so he called his sister and cancelled his visit before sitting on her bed and waiting for her to get over the shock.

Eventually, Peko woke up—not that she had been sleeping, but the world suddenly came into focus as she found herself lying in her bed with someone sitting in a chair next to it, reading a magazine. Slowly, she sat up; it felt like she hadn’t moved in weeks, which, she realized, she probably hadn’t. Peko looked over at the boy sitting next to her and cleared her throat, which made him look up and jump in surprise. “P-Peko,” he said. “Thank God, are you fucking alright? Jesus.” She took a deep breath and, after a small pause, nodded once. 

 

\----

 

It had been two years since Mukuro had died. At first, Peko had been reading up and figuring out just why the government had covered up Mukuro’s death—it turned out she had refused a large offer and was too dangerous of an asset not to be on their side. Peko continued to receive money from the Kuzuryuus and Mukuro’s military benefits, so she stayed in her apartment. She also opened a small bakery when the building under it went out of business, and ran it with Teruteru helping her out. Fuyuhiko frequently visited with his new—and pregnant—wife, and the rest of her friends bought from her as well as people she didn’t know. She named it Pekuro Bakery. She’d been thinking a lot about what exactly to do during those two years. She’d realized that yes, Mukuro was gone. Yes, the government had covered it up, and yes, she was going to get revenge and dismantle the higher powers someday. But for now, maybe, just maybe, she would be alright.


End file.
